THEY are the scourge of cyberspace, responsible for penetrating some of the most secure computer systems and wreaking havoc on IT networks.

Now a Scottish university is to launch Britain’s first degree course in computer hacking.

The country’s only government-accredited “ethical hacker” course will run at the University of Abertay, Dundee.

Students will be taught how to crack the most sophisticated security systems with the aim of advising organisations how to protect their networks.

With hacking now accounting for £10 billion of damage to British firms each year and posing a potential terrorism threat, the course works on the premise that it takes a thief to catch a thief.

Applicants for the course, due to begin in September, will be thoroughly vetted. The Home Office and the Foreign Office will help to weed out anyone who might be tempted to put their skills to criminal use, and students will be monitored to ensure they do not stray to the wrong side of the law.

Professor Lachlan MacKinnon, head of Abertay’s school of computing and creative technologies, said that the course was necessary because the techniques featured in movies such as War Games were now in common use. “The bottom line is if you want to be secure disconnect your computer now because there is nothing that will make it secure. If someone wanted to steal your money, your identity, your house, they could do it,” he said.

“If I can steal a log-on and a password to get personal information, I can use the system to order things, make inquiries, get your credit cards stopped and strip your identity away. The technology exists to allow the things that happened to Will Smith in Enemy of the State to happen to you.”

MacKinnon said that systems run by the military, banks and other high-profile organisations were highly vulnerable to hackers who could steal passwords and personal information.

Earlier this month a court ruled that a Scot accused of the biggest military hacking operation should be extradited to America to stand trial.

Gary McKinnon, from Milton of Campsie, near Glasgow, allegedly caused £375,000 of damage by hacking into US military computers using software available on the internet. McKinnon, 40, who admits hacking into the systems but denies causing any damage, faces up to 70 years in jail if he is convicted.

Last month Shell, the oil giant, was forced to suspend chip and pin payments after hackers penetrated its security system and cloned the details of hundreds of customers’ credit and debit cards. The criminals created cloned cards that were used to withdraw cash from automatic teller machines in Britain and France.

According to a recent survey in the UK, the computer systems of one in three large businesses were attacked last year. One in 10 reported that e-mails had been intercepted.

MacKinnon says that adept hackers can crack passwords within 30 seconds because most people use words that are easy to remember.

To prove the need for the course, he showed sceptical university colleagues how Colin McLean, the tutor in charge of the course, was able to obtain their passwords and log-ins within 30 minutes of hacking into the university’s computer network.

The course — which is similar to training schemes and degree programmes being run in America and Hong Kong — aims to produce a new generation of “white hats”, a nickname for ethical hackers or “penetration testers” who know the tricks of the trade and can protect companies from the criminal hackers, known as “black hats”.

Students will be taught about the ethics of hacking before being trained on a secure computer system that can mimic any network.

“We will be monitoring the students very closely because we want them to come out the other end as ethical hackers,” said MacKinnon.

“However, there is no guarantee. Harold Shipman qualified as a doctor, after all, before deciding to become a murderer.”

Dr David Capitanchick, an intelligence expert at Aberdeen’s Robert Gordon University, said there was a risk that the course could produce highly skilled criminals.

Graduates are expected to earn salaries of about £50,000 after completing the training.

Times Recommends

• How I lost the gift of joy for a while
• Why Ann Widdecombe has got it wrong
• Alas, it’s the end of the road for petrolheads